Kia EV6 Crashes, Bursts Into Flames In Budapest, Hungary

The EV6 appears to have been driven into a concrete barrier and the impact caused the vehicle to catch fire.

00:17

Andrei Nedelea

By: Andrei Nedelea

Feb 21, 2022 at 10:26am ET

Add InsideEVs as a preferred source in Google

Comment

Even though it has been stated many times that EVs are actually way less prone to catching fire than ICE or hybrid vehicles, that’s just based on statistics which can't really express nuance, but in the real world there are some instances when an EV is more dangerous in a crash. We are specifically referring to any impact that affects the battery pack or any of the vehicle’s high voltage cabling, which is what probably happened in this incident from Hungary.

We don’t have all the details, but this Kia EV6 driver was driving through downtown Budapest when he hit what appears to be some sort of concrete barrier that was in his lane. According to the only source we found for this incident, the driver was injured and taken to hospital and they also couldn't tell if this was a rear- or all-wheel drive EV6.

What do you think?

View

Comments

If it’s an all-wheel drive model, then the impact in the front of the vehicle may have damaged the electrical conduits that the high voltage cables needed to power the front motor are run through. If it was a rear-wheel drive model, then the risk of a frontal impact causing a fire would have been reduced - with no second motor there, there are no high voltage electric parts in the front or any charging port to get damaged.

In the grainy, low quality video we can’t quite make out just how much damage the car had suffered, or where exactly the fire originated. The blaze does appear to be concentrated in the front of the Kia, but it’s not coming from underneath the vehicle, so maybe the battery had yet to catch fire or only the front modules had been affected when the video was shot.